The founding of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine fundamentally changed medicine in America. In the blink of an eye, medicine was transformed from a trade practiced by poorly educated craftsmen, to a science practiced by highly educated physicians. While this transformation may seem perfectly obvious in retrospect, the challenges were significant. In the third session of this lecture-based course, join Ralph Hruban, MD, Director of Pathology and Distinguished Alumnus as he tells the story of the founding of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine through the lives of William Stewart Halsted and Jesse Lazear.

In week three, we will tell the stories of two dedicated physicians who made unimaginable personal sacrifices to fight human suffering.
- William Stewart Halsted, the first director of Surgery, is “…generally regarded as the most innovative and influential surgeon the United States has produced.” From the introduction of surgical gloves, to the promulgation of careful and safe surgery, to the introduction of residency training, Halsted fundamentally transformed surgery. He did so despite carrying a terrible crushing personal burden.
- Jesse Lazear, a young pathologist at Hopkins, volunteered to fight a deadly infectious disease that was ravaging the Caribbean islands, the United States and Central America. In 1899 he joined the Yellow Fever Board in Cuba. “With more than the courage and devotion of a soldier, he risked and lost his life to show how a fearful pestilence is communicated and how its ravages may be prevented.”

References:
1. William Stewart Halsted, Surgeon. By William MacCallum and William H. Welch. Johns Hopkins Press, 1930.
2. http://halstedthedocumentary.org/screenings.php
3. Yellow Jack: How Yellow Fever Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered Its Deadly Secrets. By John Pierce and James Writer. John Wiley & Sons, 2005.
4. https://youtu.be/JMqX8vfwDrg YouTube video we made on William Stewart Halsted
5. William Stewart Halsted: Our surgical heritage. By John L. Cameron. Ann Surg, volume 225: 445-58, 1997.